Easy Homemade Wholemeal Spelt Bread

low gluten, 100% whole spelt
Easy Homemade Wholemeal Spelt Bread

Easy Homemade Wholemeal Spelt Bread

So I will admit I came up with this recipe because I needed some sort of photo that would go along with my food intolerance article for my health section. I could not think of anything that summed up food intolerances better than bread. It seems like some of the most common intolerances are centred around wheat and gluten. The recipe was not intended to be a recipe for people that are intolerant, just something that people thinking about food intolerances could relate too. I decided to make a whole meal spelt bread. It is not gluten free but lower in gluten than wheat and a lot gentler on the system for many people that do struggle with food intolerances in general. Besides I love spelt! I think I prefer it to whole wheat, it has a much sweeter taste and finer texture. Wholewheat bread can be very dense and almost bitter to the taste. I think that is the reason most people make wholewheat bread that is part white bread, because you need something to cancel out that bitter taste. But I don’t like that because white flour is a little evil in my eyes. It is responsible, at least in part, to quite a lot of chronic health conditions of today so I try to avoid it as much as possible, especially when I am at home.

As you may already know I am a little afraid of baking. Baking bread from scratch is something I never thought I would do since it just seems so complicated! I stumbled across quite a few videos online showing different ways to bake a spelt loaf and I was impressed at how forgiving spelt flour was in baking. I set out to find the simplest, most fool proof spelt bread recipe I could and this is what I came up with. Let me tell you the house smelt amazing when it was baking. I think my husband just about fell over when he walked in the door. It is still on the dense side because it is 100% whole spelt but not as dense as wheat and just incredibly delicious especially when fresh.

Since the ingredients are not very complicated and there are no preservatives in the bread it does dry out by the next day. I actually love this because I feel like this is the sign of a healthy bread. In Romania, people get fresh bread from the bakery every morning. It is high quality bread with no preservatives or additives and is the most delicious thing you will ever eat. But it is completely dry and hard by the next morning. Usually this is not a problem since bread is eaten with basically every meal in Romania so it hardly ever lasts til the next morning. This bread is quite similar. I decided to toast the left over bread we had the next morning and it was so yum! So if you have any bread left over that goes a bit dry, just toast it and it brings it back to life! Hope you enjoy the recipe, it is the simplest most forgiving bread recipe I have come across!

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Easy Homemade Wholemeal Spelt Bread
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Cuisine: Savoury
Hazel & Cacao:
Ingredients
  • 4 cups wholemeal spelt flour
  • 1 TBSP active dry yeast
  • 3 TBSP extra virgin olive oil ( or oil of choice)
  • 1½ tsp salt
  • 1 TBSP coconut sugar
  • 1¼ cup water approximately
  • Optional toppings of choice
Method
  1. In a large bowl add in all the ingredients except for the water and mix together.
  2. Slowly add in your water a little bit at a time until a dough consistency forms. You may not need all the water. If it gets too sloppy just add some more flour until the dough becomes easy to knead. If it is too try just add a little more water. The amount of water differs depending on how course your spelt four is.
  3. Knead for about 5 minutes
  4. Leave to rest covered with a tea towel for 20 minutes. The dough should rise to about double the size during this time.
  5. Transfer your dough into a lightly greased loaf tin or shape into round shape and place in a heavy oven safe round dish like a dutch oven.
  6. Bake for 1 hour at 200 C
  7. If you would like to add toppings like I did, lightly brush the top of your bread with a little bit of soy milk or other plant based milk and then sprinkle on seeds and toppings of choice. I also added a cross shape with a large knife. You may want to bake the first 30 minutes covered with a lid and then remove the lid for the last 30 minutes so that the seeds don't burn.

Talida

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There are 6 comments on this post
  1. Sanne Jansen
    September 22, 2021, 8:19 pm

    Hi!

    Can I leave out the oil?

    • Talida
      September 28, 2021, 11:12 am

      No I dont think it would work well without the oil… you can always try though!

      • Lorraine
        November 19, 2021, 5:18 am

        Could I use baking powder instead of yeast?

        • Talida
          November 21, 2021, 7:59 pm

          I’ve not tried it. You could give it a go but I can’t promise it will work

  2. Alin
    August 22, 2023, 3:25 pm

    Are those 20 minutes enough for the dough to double in size? What should be the room temperature for such a fast rising?
    Shouldn’t be considered also a second proofing for the dough before the actual baking?

    • Talida
      August 24, 2023, 1:30 pm

      I am sorry I am not a real baker and do not bake bread regularly. This is just what I did for this recipe and it was ok but nothing spectacular, you can play around with it and see what you think. I do not understand bread making and rise times and all that.

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